HomePod Siri Working VERY Poorly After Update to 13.2.1

[fpnc]

Yes, I didn't update my HomePod to 13.2 and waited for the 13.2.1 which initially seemed to work.

Unfortunately, it now seems that my HomePod has lost the ability to respond to many requests. When I ask for the weather it just says, "Sorry, something's wrong. Please try again." When I ask about certain styles of restaurants/foods it just says, "I didn't find any matching places." When I ask simple knowledge questions it just responds, "I can't do that on the HomePod."

Thing is, all of these types of requests use to work before the update to 13.2.1. I've done power resets, software resets, disabled the personalized responses (since that was apparently causing problems for some users), and just about everything else I can think of and now the HomePod seems only about 50% of what it use to be (in terms of the ability to respond to requests). Some things still work, like podcasts, music, time of day, simple unit conversions, and the HomePod knows my current location (if I ask it responds correctly).

So, it looks like the 13.2 and 13.2.1 updates were a total disaster on the HomePod. And I've read similar reports even on Apple's Forums (particularly about the weather).

Sadly, I think Apple has almost completely orphaned the HomePod. It's one thing to stop adding features or improving the produce but it's completely unacceptable to breaks things or take away functionality.

 

[fpnc]

Here is an update. I went into the Home app on my iPad and forgot the HomePod and then reassociated the HomePod with my AppleID account.

Waited for the reboot and did the standard setup and then tried to request the weather. The HomePod said the connection had dropped but it then reported the correct weather for my location. Then I asked, "Hey Siri, who is Barack Obama?" and it responded correctly. Then I asked again for the weather and it responded, "Sorry, Something's wrong, please try again."

Now it's back again to reporting the same type of errors that I wrote about in my initial post, meaning that a LOT of the requests report that something's wrong (weather, sunrise time, etc.), or that it can't be answered on the HomePod ("...can't be done...") or that it can't find any "matching places." Again, all of these kinds of requests use to work on the HomePod before the update to 13.2.1. They also work on my iPad which is running 13.2 (even when the iPad is sitting right next to the HomePod -- with the HomePod's "Hey Siri" prompt turned off to avoid conflicts).

Note, these failures happen 100% of the time (except for the two times it worked immediately after setup) and they have been going on since my update to 13.2.1 over two weeks ago (I try the same commands every day, sometimes several times a day).

So, I'm now 100% sure this is a software bug in the 13.2.1 release of the HomePod. Some requests continue to work (100% of the time), like music, the time of day, and podcasts and some simple requests like adding two numbers, but a lot of the other knowledge seems to be missing.

I'm guessing that this is some kind of timing bug (or change) in how the HomePod responds to slow network connections. I'm running on a not too great DSL connection (maximum 5Mbps downloads) that sometimes has ping times in the hundreds of millisecond range. Thus, I think what is happening is that the HomePod is timing out too quickly when it attempts to make SOME requests over the internet.

Thing is, all of my other Apple devices (iPhone, iPad, Apple TV, and Apple Watch) seem to work fine over this same network. I also tried my Google Home device in the exact same location as I have my HomePod and it too works correctly (I normally have my Google Home in my office while the HomePod is in the bedroom).

I've also reset my WiFi router and tried moving the HomePod to within six feet of the router and none of those changes made any difference.

 

[fpnc]

I called Apple support today and reported this issue. After going through many of the standard solutions (power cycle the router, reset the HomePod, etc.) Apple put me on hold to escalate the issue and they returned in a few minutes and told me to disable the recognize voice option in the Home app. I thought I had already done that in the settings for the HomePod but what I had disabled was the "Personal Request" option that is described as "HomePod can recognize your voice to personalize requests for music" (and for services other than music).

However, what you have to disable is actually under the Home apps settings, not the HomePod settings. So, go into the Home app on your iPhone or iPad and tap on the small Home icon that is on the upper left of the screen. Then select the "People" icon (or yourself) and turn OFF the "Siri:Recognize My Voice" option.

This seems to fix the problems I was describing and the Apple service representative said that this was a known issue that would be fixed (or "addressed") in a future software update.

 

[JDnLex]

Thank you for reporting the issue and for sharing the temporary fix! I've been having issues with Siri and HomePod recently. I will certainly give this a try.